NEWSWATCH: Comrade of the Powerful

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In his mid-70s, Lippmann warned fellow journalists against "their need and their desire to be on good terms with the powerful," who were not only sources of news but dispensers of "many kinds of favor, privilege, honor and self-esteem." Later, embittered by L.B.J., he put it more succinctly: "I would have carved on the portals of the National Press Club, 'Put not your trust in princes.' "

This sound advice, rather than the contrary example of Lippmann's long career, is what the press follows. Nowadays top Washington journalists get White House invitations more as a matter of ego stroking than serious consultations. It is doubtful whether either Jimmy Carter or Ronald Reagan even faithfully reads the Washington columns. Politicians today hark to the polls, not the pundits; cocooned in their own little circle of strategists, they seem indifferent to outside advice. It is not a world Lippmann could understand or accept.